103F.003 Spring 2016 War and State Violence in the Making of Modern China

History
103F.003

Warfare and organized state violence has been a critical part of modern China’s construction over the past 150 years. What is the consequence of such violence for our understanding of PRC strategic behavior in the present day? How can these wars be placed in a larger regional context? Over the course of this time period, and across multiple governmental regimes, can a culturally ‘Chinese’ form of war be identified? Conflicts will be analyzed in chronological fashion, beginning with the Taiping Civil War of the mid-19th century, the first Sino-Japanese War, the various battles of the early republican “Warlord Period” in the second and third decades of the twentieth century, China’s participation in World War II, the Civil War between the Nationalists and the Communists, the Cold War, and China’s military involvement in East and Southeast Asia.